


Stressed

by whatwiththeegobangandsuch



Category: Game Grumps
Genre: Comfort, Crying, Fluff, Lowkey egobang, M/M, Stress
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-24
Updated: 2016-12-24
Packaged: 2018-09-11 15:28:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,407
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8996212
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/whatwiththeegobangandsuch/pseuds/whatwiththeegobangandsuch
Summary: After a stressful dream, Dan's body has to find a release.





	

Dan rolled and over hit the snooze button on his alarm, still half asleep. He’d been having a dream. Well, it had been closer to a nightmare. The past week had been super busy and incredibly stressful. He and the other Grumps had loads to record in an attempt to have a bit of a backlog so they could all go their own ways for the holidays. There were several meetings to take care of, as well as getting things settled for the two upcoming NSP albums. 

The night before had been stressful and Dan knew that the next day would be just as stress-filled, if not moreso. All these factors had resulted in this morning’s dream turned nightmare. 

Dan tried to wake up, to get his day started. However, he was still somewhat trapped in this dream. He couldn’t fully wake up. He was looking around his room, but his mind was still trying to do the tasks in his dream. 

His alarm sounded again and he smacked the button a second time, still trying to wake himself up from the increasingly stressful dream. He kicked his legs and wriggled around under his covers. He tried to will his body to sit up and get out of bed, but he still laid in bed, the dream still clinging onto the edges of his mind. 

His alarm sounded a third and final time as he sat up and began to get out of bed. The stress and anxiety from his dream wrapped around him like a shroud. He couldn’t explain why, but he felt like he just wanted to curl up and cry. 

He got out of bed and walked out into the living room. Arin was there, having gotten up a while earlier. He was still in his pajamas, scrolling through his phone on the couch. Dan could still feel the tightness in his chest from his dream. He exchanged “good mornings” with Arin as he made his way to the kitchen to make some tea for himself. 

Tea in hand, he made his way back to his bedroom to get dressed. He still felt like he needed to cry, but tried to keep his breathing even, refusing to let himself break and let the tears fall. He had too much stuff to do today to be crying for no damn reason. 

Dan set his tea on his nightstand and went to his dresser to choose his clothes for the day. His breath hitched seemingly out of nowhere. As though a seal had been broken, tears began to fall down his face and he was crying. Full on sobbing. 

Why was he crying? What was happening?

He tried to calm himself down. He took a sip of his tea, his shaking hands gripping the mug, letting the warmth spread through his body as the hot liquid flowed down his throat. He took some deep breaths, letting them out slowly. Still the tears streamed down his face and sobs ripped through his body. 

The half full mug tumbled to the floor as he slumped against the wall and slowly sunk down to the floor. He sat there, his knees close to his chest, covering his face with his hands. His hair flopped down over his hands, completely obscuring his face. Hard sobs wracked through him, and as hard as he tried to make them silent, his vocal cords betrayed him. 

Arin rushed in, hearing the clattering from the mug and Dan’s sobs, fearing that Dan had somehow gotten hurt. Upon seeing him on the floor crying, he quickly knelt down in front of him to examine him.

“Dan! Are you alright?” Dan nodded his head, then shook it. 

“I don’t know,” said Dan in between sobs. “I don’t know what’s going on. I started crying out of nowhere and I can’t stop.” He buried his head in his hands again as another wave of of tears washed over him.

Arin hurried to sit on the floor next to Dan and wrapped his arms around his shoulders. Dan quickly leaned into Arin, wrapped his arms around his middle, and just let Arin hold him. He continued to cry and Arin just held him, rubbing his shoulders and kissing the top of his head. 

“Shh. It’s alright. Let it out,” Arin whispered softly as he held Dan and rocked him gently.

It was a while before Dan was able to fully calm down. He sat up and looked around, wiping his face off with his hands. He looked at Arin and gave him a half smile. He glanced down at Arin’s shirt where his face had been previously and the big wet spot that was there now and felt his face grow redder with embarrassment. 

“I’m sorry, Arin.”

“Don’t worry about it,” Arin shushed, “I’m much more concerned with you than I am about a little wet spot on my shirt. Don’t give it another thought.” Dan wrapped his arms around Arin’s neck and gave him a tight hug. Arin hugged him back and held him close. “Are you okay?”

Dan leaned back and nodded. 

“I think so. I don’t know what happened.”

“Do you need to talk about it?”

“Maybe in a little bit. Can we stay like this for a little while longer though?” Dan asked as he cuddled close to Arin again.

“Of course we can. As long as you need. Do you wanna sit on the bed instead of the hard floor?”

“That might be better, yeah. Thank you so much, Ar,” Dan said as they helped each other up.

“Anytime, Dan. Lemme soak this tea up with something real quick, ‘kay?” Dan nodded and took a seat on the bed, trying to keep himself together. Arin rushed to the bathroom and grabbed a towel and put it over the wet spot on the floor. He’d fully clean it up for Dan later.

Arin sat down on the bed and scooted himself to the head of the bed with his back against the headboard and patted next to him gesturing for Dan to join him and resume his spot in Arin’s arms. Dan crawled up the bed towards Arin, sat next to him, and curled up against Arin’s warm chest again. Arin pulled a blanket over the two of them and wrapped it around Dan’s shoulders. 

“Thank you again,” Dan mumbled against Arin’s chest and pulled the blanket tighter around himself, “for everything.”

“Of course, Dan,” Arin answered as he smiled down at Dan.

“I don’t know what I would do without you.”

“You’d find a way.”

“I don’t want to.” Dan looked up at Arin with puppydog eyes. Arin gave Dan a tight squeeze. 

“Well, I’m here. So you won’t have to figure it out.” They sat in silence for a while before either of them spoke again. 

“Yknow? I think it might have been stress,” Dan said, looking up at Arin’s face, almost startling him with the sudden noise. 

“What was?”

“The crying. I was having a really stressful dream before I woke up and I had kinda of a hard time shaking out of it.” Arin nodded as Dan continued to speak. “I mean it’s no secret that I do tend to overwork myself. I’ve been stressing out for weeks. Maybe my body just couldn’t take it anymore.”

“Certainly possible.”

“Yeah,” Dan said softly as he returned his head to Arin’s chest. There was another stretch of silence for a bit, before Arin spoke again. 

“We’re gonna take the day off.” Dan sat up and looked Arin in the face again. 

“What? No! We still have a bunch of episodes to record.”

“We’ll be just fine. We have some backups just in case. We can post those. Today we’re going to chill out, rest, nap, maybe play some games for fun, whatever you want to do.”

“I want to get work done,” Dan said under his breath.

“And that is exactly why we’re not going to do that,” Arin said matter-of-factly. “You’re going to run yourself ragged, Daniel. You need to take a little bit of time off sometimes.”

“I know….” Arin pulled Dan close to him once again and held him tight. 

“So, we’re gonna stay right here for a while and relax.” Dan let out a small sigh and let his body relax against Arin. 

“Well I guess if we’re gonna be here a while, might as well get comfy.”

**Author's Note:**

> I'd love to hear what you think.  
> You can find me at @what-with-the-egobang-and-such on tumblr :3


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